Wednesday, November 30, 2016

This is a picture of a manuscript that I read nearly a year and a half ago, studded by sticky notes nearly too many to count. These sticky notes aren’t there to mark suggested edits but instead they mark places in the text that took my breath away, or places that taught me something I need and want to remember, or scenes that I simply loved, or confessions that triggered sober witness. Written by Carlen Maddux, a friend from my hometown of St. Petersburg, Florida, this manuscript is now a book that has been recently published by the fabulous Paraclete Press.

Carlen, a journalist, takes the reader along his and his wife's path, and while their path is one through Alzheimer’s, the practical wisdom that emerges in their story can be overlaid on any crisis. The practical wisdom is applicable to life in general. Who among hasn’t faced circumstances that we wish were different than they are?

In A Path Revealed, Carlen learns what it means to take God seriously and personally. He learns what it is to lead, particularly to lead a family. He models what it's like to truly love your spouse. Self-help books in which the author has figured out 10 steps to living with [fill in the blank] and proceeds to teach in didactic fashion pale in comparison to this wise and personal journey hard-lived on every page.

Recently, I asked Carlen a few questions about the book, the writing of it, and the path through crisis, and he graciously responded.

This is your first book – why did you decide to write your story for a broad audience?

CM: While trying to develop my story line, I found two strong themes running along parallel rails: 1) Alzheimer’s and its potential for destroying a family; 2) The spiritual odyssey that emerged. I struggled trying to decide which was the organizing theme. Early on, I tapped a couple dozen readers for feedback; half of them didn’t know us. Each one of them told me that the focus of my story was this spiritual journey. Alzheimer’s was the context, they said. Developing this then as a spiritual odyssey moving through a life-threatening crisis immediately moved our story into an audience broader than one strictly interested in dementia. A clinical psychologist, who was one of my early readers, says this on the front cover: “This book belongs on the nightstand of every family coping with a crisis.”

In the book you wrote that your reporter instinct kicked in after Martha's diagnosis, driving you to try to figure out whether there was any way out of Alzheimer's. As you came to realize there was no way out of that particular diagnosis, what primary question, or questions, took that initial question's place?

CM: It was the most primeval of questions: HELP?!

How was journaling during this time instrumental in helping you find the way through this maze?

CM: I started a journal almost from the day Martha was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. She was 50 at the time; I was 52. I didn’t begin writing a journal for “spiritual discipline” reasons. I did it to survive. I had so much information coming at me, and so many questions stirring up inside, that I needed a central clearinghouse. The idea of a journal instinctively arose. I’m glad it did. Soon enough, my thoughts and writings evolved into issues deriving from this spiritual odyssey. I wrote in this journal for a decade, consuming 14 volumes. My last entry was the day my wife moved into her nursing home.

How did the act of writing the book – even before you had a plan to publish it with Paraclete – help you achieve the wholeness that you referred to in the book's Prologue?

CM: Writing my book almost didn’t happen, I say in the Prologue. The raw material for the book had to be the journal I’d kept, and I initially found it too difficult to open after having closed it five years earlier. Somehow I got past that grinding feeling. As I read and scanned the 14 volumes in no particular order, story fragments began linking together. Not only that, memories of conversations and images were awakened that I’d not written down, helping me to add color and texture to our story. Fourteen years into our journey—about the time I started to write my book—I suddenly realized how far our family had traveled, and from where we’d come.

At the end of the book I open my Epilogue this way: “Only recently has the meaning of my walk with Martha at Gethsemani come clear to me, carved out like a statue in relief by the intervening years.” (A month after her diagnosis, Martha and I visited the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky and climbed up a wooded hill.) I continue: “Our family has stepped over jutting rocks and tangled roots and moved through a wooded darkness speckled with light. We have stumbled onto sunlit clearings and paused at the wonder of it all, lingering with delight before turning back to the path set before us. Yes, ours has been a maddening and frustrating journey, disheartening even. Yet somehow this walk—our walk—has followed a sacred path, pointing our way toward a Presence far greater and more real than any entrapment by a disease.”

How does the path through your crisis help people who find themselves in their own crisis, whether or not it is related to Alzheimer's?

CM: That’s a question best left to my readers. Based on the feedback I’ve received, though, our odyssey has so many twists and turns, dead ends and fitful starts, and yet a hope and joy emerging from this milieu, that the story seems to connect at levels that are unique to a reader’s particular crisis. How that happens, I’m not really sure. I do know that they feel a certain authenticity with the pain, suffering, and confusion I share, and thus an authenticity with the hope, love, and joy that arose.

~~~

[Photo: taken of the many sticky notes that marked my reading of Carlen's manuscript]

Thursday, September 22, 2016

Reading from Joel, “And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. ” I love that “and afterward.” What’s to come, after whatever has been endured is past: a statement of hope. As to a child, now we’ll let the nurse give you your shot, but afterward, on the way home, we’ll stop for ice cream. Or now, dear child, dear husband, dear friend, dear self, all you can do is hunker down and do what you need to do to live, to get through the day, the month, but afterward, when the pressure lifts, and it always does eventually, you will breathe again, you will daydream, you will have a vision of what life can and will be.

Tuesday, August 09, 2016

Last week I went to a memorial service of a friend I had known since childhood. She died too young, only a year older than me, and suddenly. And a few days ago I learned that another person from my childhood past, the brother of a dear friend, also just died, also too young, a year younger than me, and suddenly. Writing and delivering a meditation for a funeral or memorial service must be hard enough for any minister but all the harder when the person who died had so much life still ahead. The meditation at the memorial service I attended was spot on, with the spot being that sweet spot where grief meets hope meets how-then-should-we-live encouragement. Teach me, the minister recited from the Psalms, the minister who was choked up herself, the minster who was also saying goodbye to a best friend. "Teach me to number my days, that I may gain a heart of wisdom." The need for mindfulness about our days that have a limit, she said – but more than that. The need for wisdom, she said – but more than that too. Teach me. The need – the plea – to be taught by the Lord God who loves us.

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Last Sunday was confirmation Sunday at my church. Eight ninth-graders wore white gowns, representing baptism, and red stoles, representing the Holy Spirit, to mark the completion of two years of study and service. They each spoke a few minutes about their understanding of faith and what it means to be a Christian and then received some gifts: salt (be salt of the earth), a candle (shine your light), a cross, and a small slim leather Bible engraved with their name. Those of us in the pews gushed from pride and joy even if they weren’t our children because they are our children.

Our pastor said that confirmation and graduation seem like similar events but in fact they’re quite different: a graduation implies an end of something, whereas confirmation is about beginning. He said that the beginning marked by confirmation is that of taking on a new role. The young adults clothed in white and hugged in red now take on the primary responsibility for their own faith development. The church is here, parents are here, teachers are here, but the journey of faith is one's own.

A bonus in being present for a ceremony or sacrament, in addition to being part of the event involving people you care about – be it a wedding, funeral, baptism, graduation, or confirmation – is that we ourselves get to enter into that space where transactions are made, commitments are offered, hope is claimed. Quietly and passively but with as much inner and hidden, active agency as we wish, we get to engage with the life passage marked by the ceremony or sacrament. Yes, I do, till death do us part; let not my heart be troubled; please grace, flow; beginning again, I intend to grow.

~~~

[Photo: taken of a full nest safe inside a hanging basket outside my front door several years ago.]

Thursday, March 03, 2016

Film director Pete Docter gave something back to the audience in his acceptance speech for Best Animated Feature for Inside Out at the Academy Awards last Sunday. If you haven’t seen Inside Out, it’s a wonderful film about an 11-year-old girl who becomes miserable after a cross-country move.

Here’s what Docter said:

“Anyone out there who’s in junior high, high school, working it out, suffering — there are days you’re going to feel sad. You’re going to feel angry. You’re going to feel scared. That’s nothing you can choose. But you can make stuff. Make films. Draw. Write. It will make a world of difference.”

Adults were listening too.

It reminded me of advice given by Merlyn the magician in King Arthur’s court as told in The Once and Future King by T.H. White.

“The best thing for being sad,” replied Merlyn, beginning to puff and blow, “is to learn something . That is the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then—to learn. Learn why the world ways and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the thing for you. Look at what a lot of things there are to learn—pure science, the only purity there is. You can learn anatomy in a lifetime, natural history in three, literature in six. And then, after you have exhausted a million lifetimes in biology and medicine and theocriticism and geography and history and economics—why, you can start to make a cartwheel out of the appropriate wood, or spend fifty years learning to begin to beat your adversary at fencing. After that you can start again on mathematics, until it is time to learn to plough.”

Wednesday, March 02, 2016

Heather Choate Davis is a new virtual friend of mine. We “met” last summer when I was considering taking on a medical writing project for a new client: writing a packet of information for parents of children with brain tumors. It felt daunting and sobering. Years ago I had read the classic memoir by John Gunther, Death Be Not Proud,about his son’s illness and death, but I needed more insight into the parental experience. I went to Amazon and put in some combination of the search terms: memoir child brain tumor. I narrowed the results to what was available on Kindle, because I needed it fast and was going away for the Fourth of July weekend. Up popped Heather Choate Davis’s memoir, Baptism by Fire, about her experience of her daughter’s brain tumor. It’s also a story of coming to faith. I loaded it onto my Kindle and went out of town, reading it in the car, lakeside, and amidst holiday sparklers and barbecuing. I had a hard time putting it down.

After finishing the book, I looked up Heather online and from her website saw that we had some things in common, such as the Glen Workshop experience, and so I sent her an email telling her I loved her book and was happy to find her work. She wrote back, and we found each other to be kindred spirits.

Heather’s latest book is happy are those: ancient wisdom for modern life. I had the privilege of reading an advance copy of the manuscript and loved it. It’s a meditation on the first psalm, the one that starts with “happy are those who….” I’ve read that psalm more times than I can count, but this was an experience of hearing it new. The book is small and a pleasure to hold - it really is no longer than a pen. Its layout and structure moves you forward bit by bit almost without you realizing how broad and deep an understanding of wisdom it's building from the first page to the last. So much wisdom! I love its gentle and peaceful tone.

Awhile back I wrote a blog post about a young woman who came to see me and told me that it seemed like there were no adults around and life was so chaotic, inside and out. Reading Heather’s manuscript brought that blog post to mind and made me think: this book is like having a grown-up present; this book can speak calm hope and order into lives that often feel confusing and chaotic.

I asked Heather a few questions about happy are those, and here's what she had to say.

What's the rationale for making the happy are those so physically small?

HD: Well, I think the size is a big part of its appeal. We are all so overwhelmed with content. And most books about the spiritual life are pretty weighty (or worse, filled with fluff). The Barna Group tapped into this problem a few years back and experimented with a series of small books called Frames. Great idea, and again, based on the premise that we buy lots of books and never seem to get past the first few chapters.

I wanted happy are those to feel really fresh and light and unintimidating—something you could put in your purse or backpack or even back pocket. And just in the first weeks of the release I’ve seen this to be true. People love the color and the cover, which really draws them in. And then when they pick it up they get sort of a child-on-Christmas-morning look as they thumb through it and see how short it is and how much white space there is, and they think, “this is a book I could actually read!”

With all the passages of wisdom in the Bible, why did you pick Psalm 1?

HD: It’s funny you should ask that because I didn’t really pick it—it picked me! I have used the psalms and the prayer practice of lectio divina for as long as I’ve been a Christian — 20+ years now. So that aspect wasn’t new. But then last fall a writer/theologian friend, Gary Neal Hansen, sent me a little booklet about the prayer practice, and one of the suggestions he had was to try praying the first psalm. So I did. And I found myself going deep into the psalm, and starting to make feverish notes, and doing some follow up study on key words and phrases. After a few days I wrote in big letters along the top of one of the scrawled pages: Is This A Book? As soon as I wrote it I knew that it was.

I think it also helps that the psalms are sung prayer-poems, an idea which resonates with many in the new creative economy. They are also part of world’s trove of “wisdom literature,” which is a more compelling, less fraught source than other parts of Scripture. The fact that the first psalm is also known as The Two Ways of Living speaks to clarity and simplicity of message, as well.

How do you recommend a person should read this book?

HD: I originally thought people would read it straight through over a cup of coffee. It takes about an hour and a half. But what I discovered is that folks—particularly young adults—are really taking their time with it. Reading a few pages that riff on a single word or phrase from the psalm, and then pondering that for a while before going on. The book is an interesting mix of deep wisdom and easy conversation; as with most things, approaching the work slowly and thoughtfully is going to bear more fruit.

Who are you imagining your readers to be for happy are those?

HD: I didn’t initially write it with a target audience in mind, but as I came to revise the work it became clear to me that the heart of it was all about millennials—those beautiful young people who long for answers about how to navigate their lives, to find purpose and meaning—and, yes, happiness—but wouldn’t think of going near a church for that kind of wisdom. So what this book really tries to do is remove some obstacles and create some entry points for them. To help them see that there is some life wisdom that tolerance and technology have not made obsolete. That this desire they all have to know who they are Meant To Be doesn’t really make any sense without a One Who Meant It.

Ultimately, I hope they walk away from the book knowing that they do not have to live with this incessant pressure to perform, compete, and self-actualize. To know that who they were meant to be is already more than they could ever dream of. And happy are those who are willing to receive the gift of knowing just that.

~~~

Think about getting a copy of this book for yourself or for someone you know who needs a voice of calm hope in their life. You can order happy are those from Amazon. You can read more about Heather and her other books on her website.

Thursday, December 31, 2015

At the risk of boring some of the long-time readers of this blog, I'm once again posting my list of New Year's intentions, as I've done twice before. I hear from readers that this list has been meaningful and that it has been borrowed, adopted, adapted, and printed out. May it be helpful and welcome yet another year.

The list is largely the same as I when I posted it last year but for a few changes. As before, I use the word "intention" rather than "resolution," because it implies something to work toward, move toward, rather than something at which you either succeed or fail. Part of the reason I like to revisit this list – need to revisit this list – is because these are things I still keep moving toward myself. The process is lifelong.

Here's what I'm intending:

Experiment more.Create more; consume less.Trust more; worry less. Read more; write more; watch less.Write more of what lasts longer.Waste less time.Spend more time in "creative idleness".Spend less; save more.Pray more, including for the people who read the words I write.Use more paper, lots of paper.Use a pen more, a keyboard less.Love more.Talk less but say more.Figure out how patience and urgency co-exist.Hope always.Cook more; eat less.Start sewing again.Play the piano more. Pursue truth, beauty, and goodness at every opportunity; realize every moment is an opportunity.Stand up straighter.Speak more often in the strength of my own voice.Find the way to do what needs to be done; sit quietly and wait for the Lord.Accept paradox.Pray more, pray without ceasing.Hope more absolutely.Be more available to and vulnerable with God and others.See the signs, ask for signs; be more willing to step into the unknown.Use less; have less; give more away.Shorten my to-do lists.More intentionally be a conduit for the flow of God's grace to the world.Be silent more often.Pray more fervently for safety coast to coast but live less fearfully.Remind myself as often as needed where true hope lies. Start fewer projects but finish more of those I start.Be encouraged.Be excited.Hope more purely.Be more attuned to the burdens of the people I pass on the street as well as those with whom I share a table or a home.Love God with ever more of my heart, soul, strength, and mind.Thank more.Eat less sugar but more dark chocolate.

I'd love to hear some of your intentions. If you want, you can share them in the comments below or on Twitter (@NancyNordenson).

~~~

[Photo: taken of berries and bare branches this week at the American Swedish Institute.]

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

I spent a couple hours this morning reviewing my blog posts from 2015. In The Art of Thinking, Ernest Dimnet wrote, “To keep no track of what one learns or thinks is as foolish as to till and seed one’s land with great pains, and when the harvest is ripe turn one’s back upon it and think of it no more.” I agree with Dimnet and so look back at posts, journals, book notes, and other evidences of – and learning from – this life journey, this blog being a piece of that. I believe in being a student of one's life.

But I also reviewed my posts in order to gather them together in one place with some kind of organizing structure for readers' use. New subscribers have come on throughout the year and may find this a handy list of posts, and even regular readers miss posts or may like to revisit posts. Here they are – well, most of them – grouped into categories.

A couple preliminary comments: 1) this is the year that Finding Livelihood came out so that category got a heavy weighting; 2) these categories are fluid and artificially narrow - for example, most of the posts could be under a single category of "paying attention to your life" or "living with intention" or "living a meaningful life," and the posts for books could be distributed under multiple categories, and the posts "on hope" could just as well be listed as "on love" or "on pilgrimage."

I offer this list to you as a place in which to dip in and read, to peruse at random or with strategy, in the hope that whatever words you choose to read or re-read may come alongside you as you wind up your 2015 and launch whatever is next.

Aiming at the intersections of thought, faith, imagination, and beauty in everyday life.

Established 2004

"Thou takest the pen – and the lines dance. Thou takest the flute – and the notes shimmer. Thou takes the brush – and the colors sing. So all things have meaning and beauty in that space beyond where Thou art. How, then, can I hold anything back from Thee."
–Dag Hammarskjöld, Markings

By day I'm a medical writer. After hours I do another kind of work. Creative writing, spiritual writing, essaying. This blog arises from those after hours. I write about work/vocation, meaning, hope, imagination, faith, science, creativity/writing, books, and anything else I feel the impulse to write about. I hope these short posts provide camaraderie for your own creative and spiritual life.